Sing you home
by detective-smartypants
Summary: After being seperated two years after the death of their mother, Jude eventually finds his way to the Fosters and Callie falls off the face of the earth. The only thing that ties them together is a string of letters they exchanged during their first year apart. Jude's adoption makes him curious about his sister and he decides that it's time he figures out where she's been.
1. No other way

**A/N: This idea just wouldn't leave me. **

**I don't own the fosters, unfortunately. **

_**July, 2010. **_

"Look at me." She demands, gripping onto his shoulders with a force that turns her knuckles white. "Hey, Jude. _Look _at me."

He tries to keep his gaze focused on the ground, but she pulls his chin up with her thumb. "It's going to be okay, understand?" Her voice is firm and steady, like it always is in tough situations, and he doesn't understand how she can be so strong. They're supposed to be a package deal; that was the promise. They're supposed to be together until they find their forever home, that was the plan. He sniffs and shakes his head. "I'll write you letters every day, okay?"

He nods his head gently and, as much as he tries to avoid it, as much as he tries to be strong like his sister, the tears come anyway. "I don't wanna leave you, Cal."

"They're a _good _family, Jude. I know I said that we would always be together but...I just couldn't forgive myself if I watched you let them go."

He takes her hands and stiffs away the tears. "I dont understand why they can't take both of us."

"I know, baby. It sucks and I'm sad too, but I promised you that i'd do everything in my power to keep you safe."

He sighs. "You promised that you'd do everything in your power to keep us _together_."

Callie bends down so they are at eye level and she wipes a tear away from his cheek. "Your safety comes before everything else, Jude. Just...be safe for me, okay?"

"Promise me, Cal." He whispers.

"What?"

"Promise you'll take care of yourself. Promise that you'll always write. _Promise._"

She smiles and nods her head, not a doubt in the world. "I promise. And Jude?"

They're waiting now, warming up the engine with all of his things in the trunk of the car, they want to take him home, away from here, away from _her_. "Yeah?"

"Come find me when you can."

They take him by the hand and lead him to the car.


	2. Someplace

**A/N: Thanks so much for the response to the first chapter! I've been debating whether or not the name of this story is okay for the longest time, it was a close call between this and _dear Callie_ but idk, this was my first choice so I went for it. Anyway, to those who mentioned the length of the first chapter – I always like to start stories with small chapters, just to give people a feel without dragging it on too much, idk. Hopefully this makes up for it. **

**PS. to any of those who read _Hopeless Wanderer, _I'll be updating it tomorrow!**

* * *

_**January, 2014 **_

The family that they'd been torn apart over, who'd offered Jude a home forever, hadn't lasted as long as he'd hoped.

They'd taken good care of him, sure, but he'd never felt quite at home. The only thing that really kept him grounded was the constant flow of letters he'd been sending and receiving from Callie. They came in every single morning, without fail, and each one came with a small gift. Sometimes it was novelty things like toys and chocolate, other times it was money, sometimes it was gift vouchers. He never really bothered with the gifts, though, it was the words that he clung onto with his dear life. For seven months, they came from a return address in San Diego and then, later, started arriving from somewhere in New York. He had folded up every letter and placed them in a small box under his bed so that he could read them at night, so that he could imagine that his sister wasn't on the other side of the country.

She never seemed to talk much about what it was that she was doing in New York, or how she had even ended up there in the first place. She just asked him how he was doing, how the food was, how the family was, and he always gave her a positive response even if it wasn't entirely the truth.

They fell into a pattern of making things seem more simple than they were, but Jude couldn't help but worry. He had a family, a home, and some good friends. Who did Callie have?

He never told her once that none of it seemed worth it without her by his side.

Two years into being fostered by the Halperts, their young son, michael, got sick. They were sorry to say goodbye to Jude, they promised that they had his best intentions at heart.

He didn't really mind though, he always knew that this was only temporary.

That's when he stopped receiving the letters. He figured that his address must have gotten lost in with the moving, but he had high hopes that she'd find him again.

He wondered what it was like in New York, he wondered if she was eating enough, if she had a home, if she was happy. It can get cold there in the winter, he always thought to himself, Hopefully she has a jacket.

He spent some time in a group home and then a placement with a less than pleasant man that only lasted a couple of months before he he was placed with the Fosters.

Nowadays, he knows what it's like to really belong to a home. He's happy, healthy, and loved. For a while, he thought about Callie less than he had before. He knew she was strong, and so he had himself convinced that she was probably already adopted by some lovely rich family, living in the East end of New York.

But ever since they asked him about the adoption, ever since they asked him to be their son, he hasn't been able to get her out of his mind.

He hasn't told them about her because she told him not to when they'd been seperated.

"_You don't tell anyone about me, right? I don't want me ruining your chances at a forever family." _

But he always wants to tell them about her, talk about how she was always so protective, talk about how she always put his needs ahead of hers. He wants to shout it sometimes, _I have a sister! _But he always keeps quiet.

It's been a week since they announced the plans to adopt and now he's sitting on the edge of his bed with a box of her letters on his knee. He pulls out one and opens it up, a pouch with a bean falls out onto the floor and he smiles.

* * *

"_I wish I could find some magic beans." _

_He's four, and Callie is sitting at the edge of his bed reading him a book of fairy tales when he speaks up. _

"_What do you need magic beans for?" _

_He smiles. "Well, I mean, then one day I could see what it's like to walk up on the clouds." _

_She laughs and closes the book. "Well, I'll see if I can get you some of those, Jack."_

* * *

He opens up the old, wrinkled letter and reads it for the 100,000th time.

_Jude, _

_I hope that you are okay. I can't stop thinking about how much I wish that I could have gone with you, and how much I hope that you don't hate me for the decision I made. Right now, you're young, and so you might not fully understand why we've been seperated, but you'll get it soon enough. Trust me. _

_I just hope you know that it's for the best, that it's so that you can have a better life than you would stuck in the foster system. _

_It's been a while since I heard from you, and yet I still continue to write these letters. I'm sure you're busy with school, or your family, or whatever. I don't mind you not replying, I just don't have it in me to stop writing. _

_Things in New York are okay. I managed to get myself into a good group home since the family I was living with ended up having to move to Australia due to a family emergency. I have a job now that I go to every day after school, I want you to know that I'm saving all of my money in case you need me to come and find you. _

_I miss you, bud. Like, every single day. It gets harder and harder, and I hope that it isn't as painful for you as it is for me because, frankly, it's exhausting. I'm sorry that I couldn't keep my promise, Jude. _

_Just please don't ever forget that I will be there in an instant if you need me, okay? _

_Love you, _

_Callie. _

He closes over the paper and sighs. This was the last letter that she sent, or the last letter that he'd received. He assumes that it has something to do with moving out of the last house; he thinks that maybe the family never bothered to send another address for her.

He wonders what the letters would look like now.

He wonders if she'd ever admit that she might need him just as much as he needs her.

A knock at the door shakes him from his reverie and he hides the letter under his pillow, looking up to see Stef standing at the doorway with a warm smile on her face. Sometimes, Stef reminds him of Callie.

"Jude, sweets. Dinner's ready."

He follows his mom down to the kitchen to sit down for dinner and does what he's been doing every night for the past month. He looks around the table and he thinks about Callie.

What would the fosters think of Callie if they knew her? Would they think that she has lovely eyes? Would they be grateful for how protective she is? Would she enjoy Lena's cooking? Would she get along with Mariana?

Would she be safer than she is right now?

Would she be _happier_?

Because, as much as he doesn't care to admit it to himself out loud, he _knows _that she's not as happy as she used to be. He hasn't heard from her in two years, but the last letter he received had worried him a little, she had been a little less convincing.

He shakes the thought away and goes to work on convincing himself that she's currently living in a brownstone in New York with a lovely mother and a caring father.

Later that night, before he goes to bed, he decides to write another letter to her in hopes that she might receive it from her last known address. He'd tried it before a few times but had never heard back.

He hopes that, maybe, this time he'll be more lucky.

_Dear Callie, _

_I know that it's been a couple of years since we last spoke, a lot of stuff got in the way and I'm sorry if you sent me anything that I didn't receive. I never got adopted by that family, but I've finally found my forever family. I'm getting adopted, Cal! Can you believe it? _

_I have two moms, one of them is a cop and the other is the vice-principle at my school, anchor beach. I have two brothers and a sister and I live in a really really nice house and I'm really happy. _

_I miss you, Cals. Like, a lot. I hope that you are doing as good as I am. I hope that you haven't forgotten about me, and I hope that we can finally meet up again soon. I haven't told this family about you, but I will one day. They're all really accepting and nice and so I think that they'd like to hear all about you. _

_My mom, Stef, reminds me of you. She's stubborn, and very protective. I think that you'd like her very much. _

_I want you to write back if you get this. I need to know that you are okay, even though I know you well enough to understand that you might not actually tell me if you're not. _

_I hope that you have a forever family, cal. But don't forget that I will always be your brother. _

_Love you lots, _

_Jude. _

_PS. I never did plant that bean, found my way up to the clouds without it thanks to you._

In the end, he sighs and scrunches up the letter before tossing it into the trash. He can't handle being disappointed one more time.

Hopefully, one day, she'll find him. It can't be that hard, _can it? _

* * *

**A/N: I hope that was okay, I'll try update again asap. Please please _please _let me know what you think. I'm not going to drag it out for too long, so Jude might have to tell the parents (or they might have to find out themselves) about Callie soon. **

**I'd also really appreciate some ideas on where to take this story. I have some major parts planned out, but maybe some requests or suggestions from you guys might help me figure the blank bits out! **

**Thanks again.**


	3. I speak because I can

**A/N: sorry for the delay in updates, I sort of started this out without a _real _plan. I knew what I was doing with the start and the middle, but the bits in between – no clue. It took me _ages _to actually come up with _anything _for this chapter and even then, I was rather disappointed. **

**PS. If you've read any of _Hopeless wanderer, _you'll know that I'm a sucker for flashbacks, sticking with that in this story. I like writing little callie and Jude.**

* * *

"_Close your eyes and count to Five." _

_Jude is only turning five, just tall enough to see over the large oak wood table in their living room and Callie is sitting at the head chair with a box in front of her. He covers his eyes with his hands, but keeps his eyes open so that he can peek through his fingers. _

_He counts slowly. _

_One Mississippi,and she lifts the lid off of the box. _

_Two mississippi, and she smiles wide as she looks at what's inside. _

_Three mississippi, and their dad get's home from work with a loud bang and yell. _

_Four mississippi, and she sighs as she takes the cake out of the box. _

_Five mississippi's and she's telling him to look. _

_He wanders around the table and climbs up onto one of the high stools. Sitting in front of her is a cake shaped like the moon, and he smiles at the text on the front. _

_**Happy birthday Jude, Love you to the moon and back. **_

"_I love it, Cal!" _

_Seven mississippi and their dad tells them that the cake is silly, and then shouts at Callie for spending her allowance on something so stupid. He grounds her and hides the cake away so that neither of them get a slice. _

_But Callie brings him a slice once their dad has fallen asleep on the sofa. _

…

"Earth to Jude."

Jude looks up from the cupcake on his plate and smiles. "Sorry. What were you saying?"

Stef sighs and shakes her head with a small smile. "You were in Jupiter again, weren't you?"

It's like Stef knows when he's thinking about her, like she _knows _he's hiding part of his life. Because _every _time he's stuck in a memory of something she's done for him, every time he thinks about where she is or what she's doing, Stef does that exact same thing. _You were in Jupiter, Jude. _

He smiles at her and shrugs. "I was just thinking about how I was going to eat a cupcake this big. It's _huge_."

Stef and Lena let out a laugh and the buzzing of the family dinner chat ensues.

"So, I hear you're doing good in English, Jude. Your teacher told me that you wrote a really wonderful essay about family, care to share?"

He nods slowly and looks back down at his cupcake. Yes, it might have been a good essay. Yes, the teacher might have thought it was sweet and honest. But he'd hated writing that essay, he'd _hated _how he couldn't talk about how courageous his sister was, and how she did _everything _for him, how she'd given up _everything _for him. He hated that essay because it wasn't the truth.

This family is perfect in mostly every way, they offer him everything that Callie needed him to get, they're the _reason _he doesn't have his sister anymore, although not directly. Yet he _hates _that she can't be here, too. He hates that her leaving him alone was the reason he ended up here in the first place.

"It was just about you guys, about how you've given me so much." He smiles. "I don't really want to read it out though. Is that okay?"

"Sure, bud." Lena says, smiling. "and we love you, you know that, right?"

"Yeah," Jesus jokes. "You're definitely their favourite."

Stef slaps Jesus' arm and turns her attention to the tray of cupcakes in front of her. "Okay, first one to bring down the trash from their room gets first choice of cupcake tomorrow."

- – -

He decides to pull out the box of letters again that night, the memory of them on his birthday eating away at his mind. He flicks through the piles of letters and picks out the first one his finger lands on and opens it up.

_Jude, _

_I loved the picture on your last letter, I immediately put it up on my wall beside my bed. I got placed in a home yesterday, finally, and the family are really nice. I've managed to save up a total of $287 so far, if you ever need anything or need me then just let me know, you know I'll do anything for you. _

_Yesterday I was watching the powerpuff girls with the little girl in this home and it reminded me of all of those times you used to pretend you were mojo jojo and I was blossom and we'd chase each other around the back yard. _

_As per usual, things are okay. How's the weather? Hows the home? _

_I hope you're a step closer to being adopted, you know it's all I want for you. _

_Love you to the moon and back. _

_Callie. _

_PS. Please find enclosed some reeces peanut butter cups, no one can be sad when they have peanut butter cups. Love you. _

He closes his eyes and pictures them, four and eight, picking up stones on the beach. Three and Seven, making a huge fort in the middle of the living room. Five and Nine, playing cops and robbers in the back yard. He pictures her laughing, head thrown back. He pictures her telling him jokes to make him feel better, holding his hand when they found out that their mother was gone and their father was in prison.

_. _

"_I'm sad, Callie." _

"_I know, baby, me too. But it'll be okay." _

"_How do you know?" _

"_Cause we have each other." _

_._

A knock at the door startles him and he tries to hide the letter behind his back, but it's no use, Stef has spotted it, she raises an eyebrow.

"What's that?" she asks.

"uh...homework."

She sits down on the edge of his bed and her eyes fall on the box next to him. "I've never seen that box before, is it like...a memory box?"

He nods his head slowly and folds the letter over. "Yeah...just bits and pieces."

She gives him a non-believing look, but eventually just nods her head. "Principle Sanchez is worried about your math grades. Is there a reason you've gone down a grade?"

_I have no idea where my sister is or even if she's alive_. "N-No."

"Jude," She mumbles. "If something is bothering you, you should talk to us about it. We can help."

He shrugs and shakes his head. "Everything is fine."

"Okay." She nods.

She waits a minute and then, "Jude...who's Callie?"

He notices the upside down envelope siting next to him, the return address and name scribbled messily on the old paper. "uh...um..."

Stef waits, eyebrow raised, arms crossed.

"Who is she?"

Jude sighs. "She's my sister."

**A/N: Things are a wee bit slow in this chapter, but I promise you that it's really going to pick up in the next couple of chapters. It really won't be this crap every time. **


	4. Night after night

**A/N: Life got in the way...plus writers block, sorry. **

**Wee short chapter because I really just wanted to post something. **

**Enjoy and thank you.**

* * *

"_How many more homes do you think we'll need to go to?" _

_Callie closes over her book and looks down at her bother, who's sitting cross legged at the end of her bed. It's home two, exactly eleven weeks after they lost their parents and the fact that Jude still doesn't understand makes her heart hurt. She sighs. _

"_I dunno, buddy. It's hard to say." _

_Jude looks at her, confused. It shouldn't be as confusing or difficult as it is, it should be easy. Everyone else he knows just has a family that is their family, they don't meet new people every few weeks, they don't need to continuously pretend that people who are strangers are his parents. "I miss mom." _

"_I know. Me too." _

_He crawls up to the top of the bed and rests his head on Callie's shoulder. "least we got each other." _

"-I just don't understand why this isn't on your record, or why you didn't _tell _us for that matter...I mean, what if yo-"

"Stef, _calm down._"

Jude looks up at his mothers, who are sitting directly across from them, one with arms crossed and the other with a soft supportive smile.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you but...she made me _promise_. Why is it important anyway?"

Stef shakes her head and sighs. "Jude, it's important because Callie shouldn't be a secret, we should know about her. I know that it doesn't seem important to you but what if...god forbid...you got sick and we needed someone to donate something?"

Jude shrugs his shoulders and bows his head down. There is part of him that hates being shouted at, the part that never ever wants to disappoint these women that have taken him in and loved him as their own and then made him their own. But there's a small part of him that likes it, just because it reminds him that he actually does have parents that worry.

"I didn't think about that."

"We're not mad at you, Jude." Lena interjects with a small smile. "honest. We're just surprised that you kept a huge part of yourself secret."

Jude looks at Lena for confirmation of the truth in her eyes and he finds it, just like he finds it in Stef's. Stef shouts more, she's angry more, but he knows that it's because she loves so much, so hard, that she can't always keep her emotions at bay.

After a brief moment of silence, Stef takes a few deep breaths. "What age is she?"

Jude shrugs because he has to think about it, and that makes him want to cry, or scream. Something. "uh...16 by now, I think."

Stef's head pops up in surprise. "Wait, she's _young?_"

"yeah."

"And where does she live?"

She's almost afraid to hear the answer.

"I don't know."

* * *

The thought of there being a young girl out there somewhere without a family makes Stef feel sick to the stomach. The thought of her sons _sister _being out there without her little brother makes her hands shake. This young girl had to let go of her little brother in hope of him having a good life, and it pains Stef to think about a girl so young making such a mature decision.

Jude lets her read through the letters, and she finds herself reading between the lines. Reading the things that Callie is keeping from him.

_Dear Jude, _

_Unfortunately the last home didn't last quite as long as I'd hoped. It's okay, though, it really is. I'm In a great home right now, they have the best beds and they make the most wonderful food. _

_I made exactly $49 from busking this week, which is actually pretty good considering that the people in New York are a little crappy when it comes to throwing a couple of pennies in a guitar case. Current total: $489, which is enough for a flight to California if you need me. _

_Remember, you tell me and I'm there. Promise. _

_How are things with you? _

_Do you remember the song we used to sing when we went to sleep with momma? _

_I have to go, my foster dad needs me. _

_Love you to the moon and back, _

_Callie xo _

_PS. enjoy the rubiks cube, mom used to love them. _

She stays up all night reading and reading until her eyes are burning and her stomach is aching. Every word makes her feel even more guilty, every _between the line _is one more _things aren't working out so good here. _

Every _I'll be there if you need me _is one more _please need me, because I need you_.

Or maybe she's over thinking it. Maybe Callie is safe, maybe she's in a lovely house with lovely people and lovely food.

She opens up another letter.

_Dear Jude, _

_I was listening to moms music the other day, it was really quite comforting. Helped me get to sleep. _

_What's your favourite song? _

_What's your favourite food? _

_Anything changed since we last spoke? _

_To the moon _

_Cal x _

_PS. copied this pic I keep in my bag of us for you, keep it safe. _

Another

_Dear Jude, _

_I made exactly $37 from busking this week. I don't know why I always tell you this, but I do. I've saved over $600 so far, but I had to take some money out yesterday for new guitar strings. Gotta spend money to make it, they say. _

_There was a little boy in front of me in a queue yesterday and he looked exactly like you, I did a double take, but then I realised that you'd be older and taller than when I last saw you. It's weird how that works, I always worry that I won't recognise you if I see you again on the street or something like that, but my friend always tells me that there's no way I'd be able to pass by you. She says you always remember people. _

_Like mom. I was thinking about her the other day, and how I still know what she looks like and would I ever forget? Will I ever forget her voice? Her laugh? Her smile? Will I ever forget what it was like when she sang us to sleep? Or what it was like when she played music while she was cleaning and we danced on the sofa's while we watched her dust the cabinet? _

_Will I ever forget? Probably not. _

_I don't mean to put you in a downer, that's not my intention at all. Sometimes I just like to voice my thoughts on these letters, it feels a little easier than talking face to face with people. _

_I am currently healthy, happy, and warm. I hope you are, too. _

_Remember the last winter we had with mom and dad? The huge snowfight in the garden? The hot chocolate afterwards? Hope we get to do that again. _

_As always, remember to contact me if you need me. Any time. _

_To the moon, buddy. _

_Cal x _

_PS. Here's a recent pic of me just incase you worry, too. Oh, and a new set of pencils for school. _

Stef turns the seemingly empty envelope upside down and a small rectangular piece of paper falls out. She turns it around and stares at the image in front of her.

It's a young girl, maybe 14, holding a guitar in her arms and smiling up at the camera. She's wearing winter clothes and sitting on the pavement with her legs crossed and a guitar case filled with change in front of her. Her smile looks happy, but her eyes look sad. Her skin looks pale, she looks a little too thin.

But that must have been around 2 years ago, and Stef can't help but wonder what she'd look like now a couple of years down the line. Would there be parent's feeding her, taking care of her? Will her eyes be any brighter?

"She's pretty."

She feels lena's arms wrap around her waist and she nods quietly. "Yeah. She is."

"You should come to bed, it's late."

She sighs lightly and leans back into her wifes arms, enjoying the comfort emitting from her warm touch. She closes her eyes, and see's the girl in the picture taped to the back of her eye lids.

"Do you think she's okay?"

There is a brief pause, in which both women consider the same question. Both women worry about the world that Callie has been facing alone. Both women worry about the fact that the letters seem to have just stopped. Suddenly.

"We could call CPS in the morning? Ask about her?"

Stef nods and takes her wifes hand. "I'm sure she's absolutely fine."

And she doesn't really understand why her gut is telling her otherwise. She doesn't understand why it is that she's so worried about someone that she's never met, about someone she didn't know existed until just a few hours ago. She doesn't understand why she _needs _to know. She just does.

"Yeah, I'm sure she is."


	5. Not with Haste

**A/N: I don't want this to be a slow burn. Mainly because I have no idea how to make it a slow burn, mainly because I've already actually written the exciting parts and the bits leading up to it are just not coming to me very easily. **

**So I'm gonna really jump into things with this fic because I'm half nervous/half excited to share what I have with you guys. **

**And I might end up changing the rating from T to M if I feel as though it's a little too...mature...for young people. **

**This chapter might actually be really disappointing, but I promise that I've worked really hard on the next ones and they're a little more exciting. **

_**Have a great day.**_

* * *

CPS wont tell her anything.

The minute that she wakes up in the morning, before any of the kids are awake, she calls them up. They won't even tell her what state she's living in right now let alone anything else and stef wants to scream at them. She does not and never has trusted CPS.

She could use her cop status, but that would probably do nothing but put her on a formal warning at work and she definitely doesn't want that.

She finds herself opening the box of letters again and, although she partly feels as though this might be an invasion of privacy, she reads them anyway. Callie talks about music and busking, and working at a diner in new york. She talks about her friends and family _Families? _And how uninteresting school is, but she likes creative writing. Stef finds herself soaking in the girls and the more she learns about Callie, the more she wants to know about her.

She works her way through six letters when she comes to an unopened envelope and she picks it up. On the front, there is just one simple line.

_Open when you are sixteen, no later and no earlier. _

She knows she should put it back, she _knows _that this one is different. But she can't help it, she cant stop her brain from forcing her to rip open the paper. She just _can't. _

A little blue paper crane falls out and lands on the floor and Stef opens up the letter.

_Dear Jude, _

_Do you hate me? _

_You know, sometimes I find myself laying awake all night asking that question over and over in my head. Do you hate me? _

_I would probably hate me. _

_Does it feel like I abandoned you? I hope that you know that abandonment was the opposite of my intentions. Honest. I never wanted that to happen just as much as you. We were supposed to get placed in a home together, that was always the plan. The thing is, bud, sometimes things go left when you want them to go right. Sometimes these things are out of our control. _

_And yeah, maybe what happened could have been avoided. But then, what kind of life would we have lived? What kind of life would _you _have lived? If we'd stayed together, you'd have had me and I'd have protected you, sure, but I also would have destroyed your life. I'm not a safe person to be around, baby. I have a tendency to destroy things without really meaning it. Some people tell me that I do mean it, that it's just my way of coping. _

_So was leaving you the right thing to do? Definitely. _

_Do I regret it every day? Yes. _

_Mostly when I'm missing you the most. When I see boys the same age you were when I last saw you all I can think about is getting back to you and making sure you're okay. Those moments when I hear a song that we used to sing together are the hardest, those moments are when I regret it the most. _

_But I did it for you. I'd do it again. _

_Because you're safe, and that's really all that matters. _

_So you're older now, and I am too. I don't know right now where i'll be when you read this letter, but I'm sure that we'll have seen each other again by now. At least in passing. _

_I hope you still love life the way that you did when we parted. I hope you're still as kind, as enthusiastic, and I hope you're still as courageous. _

_So we had to part ways, and I regret it every day. _

_But you're my brother nonetheless, and I love you to the moon and back. _

_Love, _

_Callie. _

_PS. _

_It's probably flat by now, but it's an origami crane. Hang it up above your bed. _

When she is done, she finds that there are tears trickling down her cheek, she finds herself holding a hand over her mouth. That one line, the one about Callie destroying things is just zooming around in her head.

How can she possibly sleep another night without knowing that this girl is safe?

_I have a tendency to destroy things. _

Stef picks up her laptop.

_I would have destroyed your life. _

She googles the New York address on the back of the envelopes.

_Do you hate me? _

And then books a return flight to New York for a week starting tomorrow.

She definitely can't feel this way for any longer.

She needs to find this girl.

* * *

"Are you _crazy_?" They're talking in hushed voices in the back yard and Lena is pacing back and forth with her arms crossed.

Stef sighs and runs a hand through her hair. "No, I just..."

"You just _what? _Stef, you're a good person, I know. I know that it's not fair what happened between Jude and his sister but...we don't know anything about the girl, not even where she lives. What do you expect to happen when you get there?"

Stef shrugs. "I don't know, I..."

"_Exactly! _What am I supposed to tell the kids? Hmm? Oh, hey, moms just away to New York for a week to find Jude's long lost sister."

"Well, yeah. That's exactly what we should tell them."

Lena lets out a frustrated sigh and pulls her hair into a ponytail at the top of her head. Something she always seems to do when she's frustrated. "And what happens if you find her?"

Stef goes to reply, but the words die off at the tip of her tongue because, honestly, she hasn't thought that far ahead. She just wants to _see _the girl. Find out that she's safe, that she's...that she's alive.

She looks up at lena and shrugs. "She's alone, Lena. Imagine that was one of our kids, Love...Wouldn't you want them to be somewhere safe?"

"I would," Lena replies softly, taking a seat next to her wife. "No doubt in the world. I would. But this is different, Stef. Callie isn't our daughter, we don't know anything about her."

"That didn't matter when you brought home Jude. Remember how hesitant we were to have him in the house? Remember how we didn't have the room? How we really couldn't raise another kid...but then we fell in love. Lena, honey, i've read enough about this girl to know that she isn't a bad person. She's just a _lost _person. I'm not saying i'm going to bring her back and adopt her, but I at least just want to see her, talk to her."

Lena sighs and nods, taking her wife's hand. "You amaze me, Stef. You know that?"

Stef laughs. "I try my best."

..

They explain to Jude that Stef will be in New York for a while looking for his sister, but that he shouldn't have high hopes that Callie will come back with her. They explain that they want to make sure she's safe and that she's in a good home and Jude takes it really well and agrees that it is a good idea.

The rest of the kids are in agreement that if Callie _does _come back with Stef, she is welcome to come to the house for at least a couple of weeks until they find her somewhere more permanent.

But Stef has a feeling right in the pit of her stomach that she might already be falling in love with this girl that she hasn't even met.

So she leaves in the morning on an early flight to New York and kisses everyone goodbye and she's nervous and excited at the same time because she might never find Callie, but if she does then she might have a chance to make someones life a little better.


	6. The City

**A/N: Summer is, unfortunately, over. Sorry for the wait, I'll try be as quick as I can between updates. Thanks so much for the lovely response.**

* * *

The first thing she does when she lands in New York is head for the address scribbled on the back of the letters.

It doesn't take her long to find the place, which is a small postal office, situated in a beat up area on the outskirts of the city, far away from the tourists and the hustle and bustle. She stands outside for a moment, taking a few calming breaths, and wondering when the last time Callie walked through these same doors was. She thinks about her coming in every single day, handing over a letter and hoping for one back in return. She wonders how long Callie came back after Jude stopped writing.

There's a boy in his early twenties leaning against the counter with his face buried in a book when she walks in and it takes her a while to catch his attention, but finally he looks up and smiles.

She doesn't waste a minute and slides the picture across the counter. "Do you know this girl?"

He picks the photo up and stares at it for a moment, she notices the recognition in his eyes, but then he shakes his head and slides it back. "Nup, don't know her."

"Are you _sure?_" Stef sighs. "Because you look like you know her. She used to send and receive letters from this address. She must have been in here at least once a day a couple of years back."

The boy looks down at the picture again and contemplates what he's going to say next. Best thing about being a cop, Stef thinks, she can read everyone like a book.

"oh," He breathes, feigning sudden recognition. "_Oh! _Yeah, I do know her. Real nice girl, she used to come in here all the time but that was a while ago. Said something about her brother somewhere in california. She didn't talk much." He sighs and lifts up the picture. "Shame about..."

He shakes his head. Stef waits for the end of the sentence with a knot at the pit of her stomach.

"What's this about anyway? You a cop?"

Stef shakes her head and straightens her posture. "No. Not today. Shame about what?"

The boy stares at the worn down picture that he's holding in his hands and smiles sadly. "She was a real lovely girl, worked at the diner across the street for a while. Said she was savin' up for her brother. Well, anyway, she was livin' on the streets and stuff and CPS or whatever found out and sent her to this foster home. She musta hated it, cause she always looked miserable. One day she came in and her face was all beat up, I mean...it was real bad. She started complainin about how her foster brother was a total dick. CPS picked her up a couple days later and we haven't seen her since. That musta been about four months ago."

Stef swallows the lump in her throat and tries to ignore the sinking feeling building inside of her. She nods slowly. "Do you know anyone who might be in contact with her? Did she have any friends or..."

"Well she was livin' with Tasha for a while, she works in the diner across the road. They got into a huge fight though, somethin' about Annie blamin' her for CPS showin' up. Don't think they talk much now."

Stef raises an eyebrow and looks at the boy, confused. "Annie?"

"Annie," He repeats. "The girl in the picture."

* * *

Tasha wont be in the shop for a few days, according to the manager and he, apparently, doesn't know anything about 'Annie'.

Stef decides to call it a night and heads back to the hotel absolutely exhausted. It's not like she was planning on turning up and finding Callie right away, but she's already a little disappointed in the lack of knowledge on her whereabouts. Her cop instinct tells her that something isn't right, that it's really odd how Callie could have ever lived here without CPS knowing she was here. She knows what the streets are like though, how many kids seem to drop out of the system and into thin air. She just hates that this girl, her sons _sister _is one of them. It just doesn't seem right.

She puts two and two together and figures that something obviously happened in California, and that Callie must have ran away. Obviously her job paid her in cash, which meant that she wasn't in any system, and according to the boy in the postal office she was crashing on Tasha's couch for a while, which meant that – again- no legal paperwork was involved.

It feels like she's trying to find a needle in a haystack.

She is _literally _trying to find one girl in the whole of New York...if she's even still _in _New York, that is. But she just doesn't want to give up.

She texts Lena and tells her that she's okay, and then lays down in bed with the TV on low for company because she can never get used to being completely alone. Just as she is falling asleep, her phone buzzes and she picks it up, expecting the text to be from Lena.

_Hi, it's Levi from the Post Office. _

_Tasha knows where She lives, if you drop by tomorrow I'll give you the address and tell you how to get there. _

_Hope you find what you're looking for. _

And then Stef can't sleep. Every time she closes her eyes, she pictures what she thinks Callie might look like now. She pictures a lost little girl in a messy big world, she pictures a million different Callie's and none of them are safe and okay.

And she just can't sleep because she's meeting Callie tomorrow. She's meeting Jude's sister tomorrow.

* * *

She knocks and she knocks and she knocks.

And just when she is about to walk away, she hears someone inside of the apartment and so she knocks some more.

"uh...Annie?" She uses the name the boy gave her, best to stay on safe ground. "Annie are you there?"

She knocks again. "Annie, open the door, come on."

She waits. "..._Callie_. I know you're home."

The shifting of several different locks caused relief to flood Stefs body. She wasn't sure why shed become so invested in this girl, why shed become so obsessed with finding her, but it was her sons sister. She needed to at least make sure she was okay.

She's taller than she is in the picture, different. Her hair is pulled up in a messy bun, her face has leftover mascara smeared under her eyes and there is a bruise covering her entire left cheek. She's wearing ripped leggings and a paint covered t-shirt and Stef has to hide a gasp at how exhausted she looks.

"Who are you?" She asks, shifting uncomfortably on her heels, she peers behind the blonde and bites her lip nervously.

"Stef...Stef foster."

"And you're here because?"

"I...can I come in? We should talk."

Callie takes a few nervous breaths and lets the question linger for a moment as she tries to figure out what to do. She nods hesitantly and opens the door to invite Stef inside.

Her apartment is plain, just a beanbag and a mattress in the corner of the room. There's no indication of any real life In the room and it makes Stefs heart hurt.

She sits down on a wooden dining chair and callie hovers nervously a few feet away, biting her nails.

"What's this about?"

Cop instincts set in. Despite the fact that Callie does look older than 16, Stef knows that she definitely isn't old enough to be living alone and she _especially _shouldn't be living alone _here_. Everything is just wrong, _too _wrong.

"Uh...well,um, I've been looking for you for a while. CPS wouldn't give me any information on your whereabouts and you seem to have fallen off the grid. Is..." she takes a deep breath. "...are you okay?"

Callie seems shocked at the concern and straitens out her face and shrugs her shoulders. "I...um...are you a cop?"

"Yes but that's not why I'm here."

"Then could you tell me. I really don't like having people over. Especially not people I don't know."

"Jude." Stef mumbles, and the girl pales an stiffens. "I'm...well we adopted him about a month ago."

She shakes her head and let's out a shaky breath. "No. _No. _You're not the family I left him with...this can't be right, I..."

"He's safe, callie."

But Callie is pacing now, running her hands through her hair. "I promised I'd get him if anything happened. He was supposed to tell me of something happened. Why...when did he?"

"About a year ago. He got moved cause the families son got sick, stayed in another home for a while and then my wife and I took him in."

"And he's safe?" She asks desperately, Stef is saddened by the tears in her eyes.

"He's safe."

Callie sits down on the beanbag and puts her head in her hands. "He's doing okay then?"

"Great, actually. Getting good grades, Working hard. He's a lovely boy, callie."

"Yeah." She mumbles. "He is."

They fall into silence for a moment and Stef watches for a while as the girl in front of her fidgets with her hands before looking up tiredly. "So why are you here?"

"He misses you. I, uh, I found the letters you wrote to him and he just..well _I _just wanted to know that you're...uh...safe?"

Callie smiles and nods her head. "He never forgot."

"The thing is, callie, he's been slowing down lately. He feels guilty because he left you, he worries about you all the time. He didn't tell us about you until just before we adopted him. Said he promised that he wouldn't bring you into any families lives. Why is that?"

Callie shrugs. "People don't take to me like they do Jude."

Stef feels sad for the girl. She's the same age as her son, but her life couldn't be any more different. It's not right, being here alone, and stef can't help but want to do something about it. "Do you...do you want to meet up with him?"

Callie shakes her head vehemently and stands up, hands rigid at her side. "You can't tell him you found me."

"But-"

"No. No, you have to leave and pretend like you never saw me. Listen, stef, I know you mean we'll but it just...it wouldn't end well." Callie opens up the front door and runs a hand through her hair, and Stef notices panic in her eyes. She takes the gesture as her invitation to get out.

She doesn't want to, but she stands up and heads towards the girl. "Callie-"

"_No." _There are tears in her eyes and Stef realises that she cannot fight her further.

She hesitantly walks towards the door, but not without slipping her card into the girls hand and sneaking one more glance at her tired eyes.

"Incase you change you're mind."

* * *

When Stef is long gone, Callie curls up in her bed and pulls out the last letter she received from Jude's address, the one that wasn't from him but from his family at the time.

_Dear Callie, _

_We recently discovered Jude's secret box of letters exchanged between the both of you. While we were mildly happy to see that Jude had been in touch with you, we cannot help but admit that it causes some concern to see how he is still attached to you. _

_Although we understand that Jude and yourself will always have a strong bond, we feel as though it is our turn to intervene and explain that this bond isn't entirely healthy for Jude or even for yourself, for that matter. While your leaving Jude was a good thing for his life, he hasn't been entirely ready to be part of this family without you by his side and that causes great worry for myself and my husband. We love Jude, we want Jude to be our son forever, and we feel as though the only thing getting in the way of that is you. _

_Sometimes it's good to let go of the things you love, Callie. Just like you did for Jude the day that you said goodbye to him and let us take him into our home. We are eternally grateful for what you did, honestly. But Jude latches on to your every word like you are still by his side and that means that I don't get the proper pleasure of being his mother. _

_Jude needs to be okay without you and as long as these letters are being exchanged, we do not feel like this will ever happen. You're not a healthy part of Jude's life anymore because you are stopping him from experiencing the things that he loves. You need to let him go, let him live without you, and then you can live without him. _

_If you'd like to meet up with him in the future, we could sort something out. However, until neither of you are co-dependent I do not believe that this is an option. _

_I would greatly appreciate it if you stopped writing Jude for the meantime, just while he adjusts to his new life with my family. _

_We hope that everything is okay, and that you are doing well. _

_Thank you for giving us such a wonderful gift, for giving us a son. _

_Sincerely, _

_Jude's mother. _

The day that she'd received that letter had changed everything. Changed the way that she viewed the world, changed the way that she viewed life, changed the way that she'd viewed _herself_. Of course, she'd continued to write for a while. Even after Jude had stopped replying.

And then one day she just _stopped_.

Because she realised that she wasn't healthy for Jude, that she wasn't making him happy, that she loves him to the moon and back and maybe that's enough.


	7. Stop crying your heart out

**A/N: Super duper long chapter because I'm busy for the next week and don't have time to write. **

**In a couple of chapters I'll start delving into where Callie has been and what she's been up to while she's been off the radar. I want to tell her story (and also include some _dear Callie _letters)**

**Thank you for the follows/favs/reviews, have a wonderful day!**

* * *

At 11pm, the night after she first meets Callie, just as Stef is about to turn off the lamp next to her bed after a long conversation with her wife, her cell rings.

She picks it up from the night stand with a sigh and rubs at her eyes to clear her tired vision, wondering who on earth could be calling her at this time with an unknown number. She clicks answer anyway and holds the phone up to her ear.

"Hello?"

She is met with an eery silence, a couple of noises that sound like cars in the background and light breathing.

"Is someone there?"

After another few seconds of silence she is about to hang up the call, drawn to the conclusion that someone has pocket dialled her, when the person finally speaks up.

"Stef?"

It takes her a moment to recognise the voice, but when she does she is immediately sitting upright in her bed. "Callie?"

A brief silence and then "Yeah. Uh, did I wake you up?"

"No." Stef isn't sure how to talk to the girl. Unlike her brother, she doesn't seem so open to deep talks, she doesn't seem so open to _people_. It surprises her, really, that she and her brother can be so _connected_ and yet so...not...at the same time. "Did you want to talk about something?"

"Uh, um...I just...well, could you maybe meet me tomorrow? Just for coffee."

"Sure. Yeah."

There is yet another strange silence, and she is sure that Callie is questioning whether or not she's doing the right thing. "Okay, I'll meet you at 9am at the coffee shop across from my apartment."

Before Stef can respond, the line goes dead.

* * *

She arrives at 8:56 and finds a table near the window so to look out for the young girl approaching. She orders a black coffee and sips on it, keeping an eye on the time. She worries that she might not show up, that she's backed out of the idea out of fear.

At 9:04, she see's her crossing the road.

She looks no better than she did a couple of nights before. Her clothes are different, but the jeans she has on seem a little loose and the T-shirt has a rip on the arm. In a matter of minutes, she's shuffling into the booth across from Stef with a tired sigh and a large cup of coffee in her hands.

"Coffee?" Stef asks with a raised eyebrow. "My kids would never get away with that."

The moment that the words leave her mouth, she wishes that she could swallow them back in. She is reminded, with a punch to the stomach, that this girl does not have a mother who can choose whether or not to let her child get away with things. She is reminded that this girl doesn't have adult supervision like her children do. In this moment, she is looking at Callie, but she is seeing Mariana.

It's something that she's been doing a lot recently, and it's something that she doesn't quite understand yet. Every time she thinks about Callie, every time she talks about callie, her mind automatically compares her to her own kids.

If this were Mariana, it would absolutely break her heart.

Callie's eyes are dark and hollow and it's only accentuated by the dark circles that are surrounding them. Stef wonders when she last slept, when she last did _anything _to keep herself healthy.

Callie clears her throat and takes a sip of her steaming hot coffee before looking up at Stef. "Does he like it there? In your home, I mean."

Stef smiles. "Yeah. He's settling in well and gets along with my other kids."

"That's good." She breathes, but Stef knows that isn't the reason she's been asked to meet her. She knows there is something else.

"Callie, is the-"

"I want to phone him." She almost shouts, trying to get the words out before she loses the nerve. She shakes her head and takes a deep breath. "Now, I mean. I want to phone him. Just quickly."

Stef stares at the girl intently for a few moments, trying to figure out what's going through her mind. She imagines that Callie has worked hard to leave behind her doubts of saying goodbye to Jude. She imagines that Callie has spent the last few years trying to tell herself that she's okay without him. She's okay without anyone.

But Stef doesn't believe it.

"I don't know...I think it would be better if you _saw _him. Spoke to him in person." She suggests it politely, wanting to spring up the idea of taking Callie on a plane home with her, but the girl shakes her head.

"I'm not going to California. I just want to talk to him, real quick."

"Callie-"

"I'm not going to California...there's nothing for me there."

Stef shakes her head and lets out a frustrated sigh. "There's nothing for you _here." _

The words hang in the air, hidden meaning pressing down on both of their minds. Callie sighs, thinking about the cold hard truth of the matter: _There's nothing for her anywhere. _

She's not a daughter, not anymore. Now that Jude has been adopted, she's not a sister. She's not an _anything_. Her life has become a matter of working endless shifts, making time here and there for school, and attempting to push through the endless onslaught of meaningless days. She's only 16, but her life is already nearing the end.

Callie sighs and takes another gulp of her coffee, enjoying the hot liquid as it slushes to the bottom of her empty stomach. She thinks about the packet of cigarettes she's got sitting at home, about the calm the nicotine brings with it. She thinks about more coffee, and about the shift she has to start in three hours that she's too tired to go to, but yet she doesn't have a choice.

Last night, all she could think about was Jude.

Today all she can think about is sleep. And Jude.

"Is he mad at me?"

Stef looks up from her fidgeting fingers and almost feels tears welling up at the sad eyes staring back at her. She shakes her head. "Not at all."

"But I left him." Callie mumbles. "_I'm _mad at me."

In that moment, Stef see's Callie for what she truly is: A young girl. A teenager. A _kid. _She might be mature enough to pay rent, to go to work, to drink coffee. But she's still young, she's still got a lot of growing up to do. In the sad eyes, Stef can see a plead for help. She can tell that Callie is too proud to say what she's really feeling and that is scared. She wants family and stability and she wants to be part of something that isn't _this_.

It's decided. Callie _is _coming home with her.

* * *

She decides to accompany Callie back to her apartment, to which Callie responds that she has nothing in to offer her, but Stef just shrugs her shoulders and follows her up anyway. She takes a seat on the plastic Chair by the table in the middle of the room and really, properly, scans the area.

There are dishes on the drying rack. A bowl, a plate and a spoon. Stef wonders how long they've been there for, when the last time Callie ate a decent meal was. Callie's bed is decorated with a teal sheet and pillows and a small teddy placed up the top. Above her bed is a set of fairy lights and a couple of pictures and beside the mattress there is a guitar leaning against the wall.

Callie disappears into the bathroom and Stef takes it has her chance to have a _proper _look around. She finds herself in the kitchen, opening the cupboards and the fridge only to find a packet of ramen, a tin of soup and a carton of milk.

_No wonder she's so thin_, she thinks, _she obviously can't afford to eat. _

She wanders over to the section of the apartment that is supposed to be Callie's room, but you can't exactly call it a bedroom considering the fact that it's in the same room as the kitchen and livingroom.

She looks at the mattress on the floor, the ripped duvet, the half-broken little lamp, and she thinks about Marianas room at home. The room with the cute little metal framed bed that Mariana had fallen in love with in the vintage furniture store. She thinks of the several sets of silk bed sheets she has for her bed, she thinks of all the pictures on her wall and her huge desk with the laptop and all the books she could ever need. She thinks of all the jewellery and clothes. She thinks of Mariana and her stomach feels weird, like maybe this is her fault.

But it's not.

She is broken from her reverie when she hears soft speaking coming from the bathroom. She walks towards the door and quietly stands outside.

_You can do this, cal. _

She sounds tired.

_You can do this. _

She sounds lost.

_Just go out there and tell her what's going on. _

She sounds scared.

_She's not bad. She can't be bad. She's not bad. _

Stef walks back to the chair she'd been in before and sits down quietly, her mind feeling heavy and exhausted, and waits for Callie to emerge.

When she does appear, a few minutes later, the first thing she does is put a cigarette in her mouth and flick the lighter. She looks up at Stef. "You smoke?"

Stef shakes her head.

"Good. It's stupid." She takes a long draw of the cigarette and closes her eyes, relishing the feeling of the nicotine coursing it's way through her body. She exhales and looks at Stef. "You have other kids?"

Stef nods, finding herself completely void of the ability to speak all of a sudden. She clears her throat and gives it her best shot. "uh, yeah. Three, two adopted and one biological."

"And now Jude." Callie mumbles. Stef nods.

Callie stays silent for a moment and stubs her unfinished cigarette on the ashtray. "and he's happy?"

"Yeah," Stef replies. "He really misses you though."

Callie nods. "I didn't abandon him, you know." She says it like she's trying to convince herself, like she's been trying to convince herself of it for the past few years. "I just did what I thought was best for him."

_But what about what's best for you? _"I know."

Callie sighs and looks down at the floor. "For what it's worth...I miss him, too."

"I know."

Stef pulls her phone out of her pocket and looks up the last picture she took of Jude. It's one of him with Brandon, and they're in the middle of laughing at something on his phone. She slides the cell along to Callie and the girl picks it up.

She stares at it for what feels like an eternity, and Stef notices tears brimming in her eyes. "He's always been so excited about life. I'm glad that hasn't changed."

"Callie, I-"

"I know what you're going to say. You think that I should come back with you and talk to him. I want to, I _do _but it's just...there's too many ghosts there. Too much happened there, it's too painful."

Stef sighs. "It doesn't always have to be that way, you know. You can make new memories, build a relationship with your brother." She takes a calming breath. "You're not happy here."

"I won't be happy there, either."

Stef hates that there's no doubt in her voice. She hates how broken down the girl sounds, how badly the world has treated her. She hates that she doesn't have hope, like every wrong turn has sucked it out of her. She hates that the girl doesn't deny not being happy. She hates this whole thing.

"You could be."

Callie passes the phone back to her and shakes her head. "It's just not that simple."

Stef isn't sure where to go with the conversation now, Callie's words had been a full stop. The end. No more talking. But Stef couldn't leave it this way, she couldn't leave _her _this way. She wants to take the girl home and give her a bed, she wants to make this okay. It might not be entirely her responsibility, but it sure feels like it is.

_You can stay with us, love. _

She doesn't want to make empty promises. She wants to take callie home, she _does_. But, as she says, it's not that simple. She could take her home and give her a bed, she would have no problem doing so. But it wouldn't solve anything else. Stef knows there's something else going on, she has no doubt about it. Someone's hurt this girl, _something _has hurt this girl.

"Come with me, Callie. Please."

Callie just sighs and looks down at her feet.

"I used to think that he'd call." She mumbles. "I used to _wait _for it. I thought that maybe he'd tell someone about me, even though I made him promise not to, and they'd ask him to call me and make sure that I was safe. One day he stopped writing and I sent him a heap of letters, waiting on replies. Just before he stopped writing his family sent me a letter saying that I had to stop writing, that it was hurting him. And then _he _stopped writing. I couldn't help be wonder...Maybe he just woke up one day and thought _she abandoned me. _You know? He never called. He never wrote. I got mad at him for a really long time. I know now that it's just because he moved, I know that he never stopped caring. But it made me give up for a really long time."

Stef reaches across the table and places her hand over Callie's. "He never gave up on you, Callie. He will never give up on you."

She nods. "I know. But what good am I going to do coming back into his life? I'm not like him, Stef. I'm not the same person that said goodbye when we were younger. I'm not..."

"You're not what, honey?"

"I'm not _okay_."


	8. Trouble town

**A/N: I lost my muse. And my free time. Haven't sat down in over two weeks, let alone had the chance to write. And those rare moments in which I actually _could _write, i've had nothing. **

**It seems like a gamble adding in OC characters but I'm just going to give it a bash as it seems as though writing a story of this premise would actually be pretty impossible without the addition of some characters that Callie might have met in New York. Plus I just read a cheesy tweeny love book and It's sort of swirling around in my head. (don't worry, this isn't going to be a cheesy tweeny love story) **

**Anyway, hope you enjoy. It's short but I have the next chapter nearly at posting point so it actually wont be long until I update again.**

* * *

"_Levi, this is Callie. Callie, Levi." _

_Callie smiles at the lanky boy sitting on the ground with a guitar case sitting next to him. He takes a pack of cigarettes out his pocket and pulls one out then extends his hand to offer Callie and Tasha one. Tasha smiles and takes one out the pack and Callie shakes her head, sitting down on the ground next to the boy. _

"_I don't smoke." _

_Levi talks with the cigarette between his mouth, his voice coming out muffled. "How very boring of you." _

_She's only been in New York for three weeks now, and she's spent the time living in shelters and hiding from sight so that no one spots a fifteen year old alone in the streets. Recently she's started to think that it doesn't matter if they do notice her, like it's one less kid to deal with. One less trashy teen to take care of. _

_Now she's got a job and, sort of, a friend. Tasha keeps asking her about her living situation, and Callie keeps telling her that she's got a place and she's pretty sure that she'll be on Tashas sofa by the end of the month. Which, honestly, isn't a bad thing – given her current bed. _

_She decides that she's done with caring so much about who she's arround and what she's doing. She reaches out her hand and takes the lit cigarette from between levi's fingers. _

"_Fine, I'll try it."_

_..._

She hasn't seen him in a month now and she doesn't know if things will be different between them now. It had become ritual to meet up with them, they had become a little group of close friends and they'd spend nights on the new york roof tops listening to bad music and smoking too many cigarettes. But when things had started to change – when _she _had started to change – she found herself going up there less. Spending less time with the decent people and more time with...

She sits down on the stool across from them.

Tasha looks angry, and Levi just looks like Levi. She's never really seen him be anything but _this_. He's sort of half smiling and sipping a cup of hot chocolate with one hand and holding a lit cigarette in the other.

"I know you're mad." Callie mumbles, and she takes a draw of her cigarette. Trying to draw a line between things that she has to deal with and things that she'll never deal with. "but you have to understand that things got messed up."

Tasha rolls her eyes and scoffs. "_You _messed it up, Annie."

"My name isn't Annie," Callie admits softly. "I lied."

"I'm not even surprised."

She looks at Levi, reaching out for some sort of life line, but he's just sitting there with narrow eyes, and it's the first time she's seen him be anything other than happy, oblivious, Levi.

"I have some things to tell you guys. I have some truths that I'm not...I'm not ready to be honest about yet. But I have things that I will tell you." Callie says. She stubs her cigarette out on the ashtray and takes a deep breath.

"My name is Callie. My mom did die, I didn't lie about that. All of that stuff is what I told you. But I got fostered by some really crappy homes and I have a brother that I was separated from. I ran away when things just didn't seem to get any easier. A couple days ago this woman, my brothers adoptive mother, came to find me." Callie sighs. "Now she wants me to go home with her."

Tasha's mouth is sort of hanging open, but she gathers herself and sighs. "I just don't understand why you couldn't have told us this..."

Callie shrugs weakly and looks down at her empty coffee mug.

"Still doesn't explain all the other stuff."

Callie looks up at Levi's words, laced in a small amount of distaste, and frowns at his face. Happy-go-lucky Levi is gone, probably left her a long time ago.

"Wha-"

"Don't bullshit us, Ann...Callie. Don't pretend like what you did wasn't crap, that ditching us for those guys wasn't the most selfish and stupid decision you've ever made in your entire life. _You _went with them, Callie. _You _messed about with them and then _you _tried to come crawling back when it all got too much. It's all on you."

She's tried so hard to put that behind her. But it's only been weeks now since she walked away from them. It's only been weeks now since.

She shakes her head and lets out an uneasy breath. "I know."

"Go get your brother," He mumbles, and he stands up, grabbing on to Tasha's arm. "There's nothing left for you here."

...

"_Okay, let's play a game." _

_It's just the three of them tonight, which means one thing and one thing only – games night. Levi brought a bottle of wine he'd stolen from his mothers cellar and Tasha has some leftover tequila from the last time so they find themselves sitting in a little circle on the living room floor with music blasting in the background. _

"_Which one?" Callie asks. _

_Levi raises an eyebrow. "never have I ever?" _

_Callie nods, Tasha nods, and in celebration they all take a swig of their wine. _

"_Okay," Tasha starts. "Me first. Never have I ever...smoked anything illegal." _

_Levi takes a drink, but both girls remain sober. Levi's turn. "Never have I ever...uh...kissed someone of the same sex." _

_Tasha drinks. Callie's turn. "uh...um...never have I ever...uh...been outside of the states." _

_No one drinks, Levi scoffs and laughs. "well that one was boring." _

"_Well I suppose I'll need to have more...life..experience next time we play." She replies. _

_Levi winks in her direction._

_..._

She cries harder than she's cried in years that night. Cries because she's found her brother, because her brother still thinks about her after all this time – even though she essentially abandoned him. Cries because there's nothing left for her here, no one left for her anywhere.

She smokes seven cigarettes and drinks half a bottle of wine and then opens up one of the letters Jude had sent her last year.

_Dear Callie, _

_I miss you lots! Yesterday I started learning how to play softball with my foster dad, he said that I'm okay at it but I need more lessons to get better. It's really exciting getting to go out and practice on the field with the other kids, but some of them are a little rude to me because I'm different. _

_My foster mom tells me that it's okay to be different, but that I should try a little harder to fit in. I used to like painting my nails blue, but I had to stop because she was worried that it'd get me bullied. I kinda miss doing it, though. _

_How are you? How is the singing going? _

_You should post a video of you singing on youtube so that I can see it. I miss hearing you sing me to sleep. _

_Love you to the moon and back (and more) and I hope to see you again soon. _

_Jude xxxx _

_PS. thank you for the chocolate and the book. I read most of the book last night and ate all of the chocolate before I went to bed. _

At 4am, she texts Stef.

_When are you going back home? Callie. _

And then at 7am, long after Callie falls asleep on top of her bed with her jeans and boots still on, the vibration of her phone wakes her up.

_Tomorrow morning. Come with me? I'll book the flight right now. _

The thought of seeing Jude fills her with such an overwhelming sense of both excitement and dread that she runs to the bathroom and vomits. She loves her brother, she _wants _to see her brother.

But she's not the same Callie anymore.

He's not the same Jude.

It's just not the same.

She picks up her phone

_Okay._

* * *

**A/N: Is it a bit too vague right now? Are the OC characters okay? Is it enjoyable? Let me know. I will start to reveal more as we go along, I _do _have a plan for this story. **


	9. Strangeness & Charm

**A/N: I _want _to update quicker, I do. I just do not have the time at all.**

* * *

"_This is a nice group home, Cals." _

_Jude peaks up from his small suitcase that he's been unpacking and Callie raises an eyebrow. "How so?" _

_Jude shrugs and smiles. "I just havva feelin. I like the games room." _

_He's right, really. They've never had a games room. "Yeah, It's pretty cool." _

_Jude closes the lid to his case and sits down on his bed, his small legs dangling over the edge. "and I also like that the beds aren't squeaky." _

_Callie smiles and crosses the room to sit next to him. Jude will always find the good in everything. Always, without fail. "Yeah, that's a plus. Annnnd we don't have to do top to toe, so I suppose I dont have to wake up to your smelly feet in my face every morning." She smiles, and Jude giggles. _

_Truth be told, no matter how nice the homes are. No matter how nice the people are, no matter how much space or food or toys or money, Callie always thinks that her brother deserves more. _

_And that seems to be the one thing that makes all this moving the most painful. Because she can settle for less, she can settle for nothing. But Jude shouldn't have to. Jude is good, Jude is important, Jude is untainted. _

"_Hey, bud?" _

_Jude looks up at his sister with a grin on his face. Ear to ear, as per usual. "Yeah?" _

"_I'm gonna make sure you get a house with a huge games room in it one day, one that you don't have to share with twenty kids." _

_Jude laughs. "How can you do that, silly?" _

_Callie shrugs. "I dunno, bug. But I will." _

…

"Callie!"

She shoots up, disorientated for a moment before realising where she is and who she's with. Stef is looking at her, concerned and she tears her eyes away from the older womans to look at her feet.

"We're about to land." Stef says. "You'll need to sit up."

Callie nods, and Stef sighs. Since meeting that morning, Callie hasn't muttered a single word and Stef is worried that maybe the girl feels like she's been forced into this. She looks uncomfortable and worried, and Stef can't stop thinking about her admission a few days before.

_Theres nothing left for me in California. _

But there is, she tries to tell herself, to make herself feel better about hauling this girl across the country. There is, she thinks. There's Jude.

Thats something.

"What were you dreaming about?" Stef asks. Callie shrugs and keeps her gaze fixed out of the airplane window.

"You'll need to talk at some point, Callie."

For a moment, Stef thinks it's a lost Cause, but then Callie takes her eyes away from the window and she sits forward, looking down at her fidgeting hands.

"Can I ask you something?" She mumbles, and Stef nods with a gentle _yes_.

"I can't go back to New York, can I?" She asks, and Stef realises that maybe Callie understands more than she thinks she does. Maybe Callie has realised that, by stepping on the plane, she's had to say goodbye to her life in New York, that Stef can't morally or legally allow her to continue living the way she has been.

But what Stef doesnt know, and what Callie will never admit, is that she is grateful.

"I had to call CPS, love. I couldn't...I had to. You understand that, right?"

Callie nods sheepishly and lets out a sigh. "Where will I live?"

_with us_. "You can crash with us until you have your feet on the ground, okay?"

She nods. "Okay."

* * *

They arrive at the house at 5pm and Callie feels overwhelmingly anxious.

It's the most beautiful house she's ever seen, more beautiful than anything she's ever lived in before. She thinks it's almost _too _pretty. She's learned not to trust anything, and especially not the things that look perfect.

She gets out of Stef's car slowly and stares at the house, suddenly finding herself rooted to the spot on the driveway.

_You can do this. _

Stef walks around to her side and reaches out her hand, placing it on her back. "Ready?"

She's not. But she nods anyway.

_You can do this. _

Step by step, the worry escalates. She isn't even sure why it is that she's worrying in the first place. He's her _brother _and she misses him, a lot. She _wants _to see him, but she also feels sickeningly guilty even now.

Stef opens the door and the smell of vanilla candles and soup hits her like a tonne of bricks.

_You can do this_.

It smells like she always imagined a good home to smell like.

_You can do this. _

She follows Stef around the corner

and there he is.

…

"_But what's so good about this family? Why have I gotta go and you don't?" _

_Callie sits down next to them on his bunk in the home and takes his hand. "they just want one kid." _

"_Then I don't wanna go." He mumbles, and his bottom lip is trembling. _

"_Jude, they're a really great family. They can give you lots of stuff and they can keep you safe." _

_Jude shakes his head. "But I don't care about getting lots of stuff without you." _

_She hates that his voice is a quivering little whisper, and she squeezes his hand. "You gotta go, Jude. You won't get another family with me here." _

"_But I don't understand why..." He whispers and he looks up at her, tears dripping down his cheeks. "I don't understand why they wouldn't want you, too." _

"_Baby, i'll be okay. Okay? I'll be just fine. Sometimes people dont like to adopt kids that are older and it sucks but it's okay. I'm okay." _

_She's trying to convince herself, she's trying to not let herself get emotional. _

_She stands up in front of him and straightens his tie, looking directly into his eyes and smiling. "Remember what I said?" _

_He nods. _

"_Say it." _

_He takes a deep breath. "Everything's gonna be okay." _

_She kisses him on the cheek. "You should go now, they're ready to meet you. And Jude?" _

_He stands up off of the bed and makes his way towards the door, but stops just before he exits and turns to face his sister. "Yeah?" _

"_To the moon and back." _

_He smiles and nods. "To the moon and back." _

_..._

The first thing she notices is his height. He's almost the same height as her now, probably a couple of feet taller than he was when they last saw each other. He's wearing a shirt and tie, just like when they parted, and his hands are straight down at his sides. He looks just as nervous as she feels and if her feet weren't stuck to the ground, she would run towards him and pick him up in her arms.

For a few unbearably long minutes, they just look at each other, faces completely blank, and then Jude walks towards her and wraps his arms around her tight. She just stands there, mouth hanging open.

"You kept your promise."

…

"_As you saw, a lot of our kids are really really lovely." _

_Callie peeks from the crack in the door and see's a man and a woman talking to the head of the group home. _

"_Yeah, there were definitely some bright young faces. We're looking for one of the youngest, we think that they'll have the best chance of adapting to living in a new home." _

_The social working notions for them to sit down at his desk, where he hands them a pile of files. _

"_Those are our youngest. The file will tell you everything you need to know about them. We don't have a lot of...troubled...kids here, but there obviously are a few." _

_The woman nods and opens up one of the files. "There was one kid...I don't know his name but he was probably about 6? brown hair?" _

_The social worker nods and hands her another file. "Unfortunately some of our kids come in with siblings that don't want to be separated." _

"_We can't take home two kids...there's just not enough room." _

_Callie knows that she'd been looking at Jude. She'd been watching him read from the doorway with a smile on her face. Unfortunately, some of the kids don't want to be separated. _

_She coughs and everyone in the room notices her standing at the doorway. Tom, the social worker, stands up and smiles. "Callie, what's wrong?" _

_Callie shrugs and shuffles into the room, smiling at the couple awkwardly and crossing her arms around her. "Nothing. I just..."_

"_Is there something you were wanting?" _

_She shrugs. "Have you met Jude?" She looks towards the woman. "He's my brother. I saw you looking at him...Maybe you should meet him." _

_She feels bad for suggesting it. But she _knows _they were talking about him. _

"_Jude...is that the little boy who was reading?" _

_She nods. "Yeah. He loves books and stuff. He's a really good kid." _

_Tom gives her a confused look. "Callie..." _

"_I heard you say that you only want one kid...Maybe you should pick Jude." _

…

The memory hits her like a tonne of bricks. The fact that she'd _told _them to take Jude had long since slipped her mind, and now the guilt worsens and she tries to make herself look normal as she places a hand on her brothers shoulder.

"I missed you, buddy."

_I'm sorry I let you down. _

"I missed you, too."

_I wish I could take it all back. _"You look bigger now."

"Yeah," He smiles at her awkwardly and shifts on his feet. "I think I get it from dad."

She nods, and realises that she hasn't smiled once since she saw him. She realises that there are tears trickling down her cheeks, she realises that her lips are trembling. She realises that it's a little too much.

She ruffles her bothers hair, lets out a shaky breath, and walks out of the house to the front yard.


	10. to be alone

**A/N: I've written this chapter 10 different ways, and I just never seem to be happy with the way it ends up each time. **

**Got a lot of stuff going on right now, never have time to write unfortunately. Thank you for all the follows/favs/reviews, means a lot!**

* * *

"_I miss mom." _

_It's been two months, and she keeps telling herself that she should be getting stronger by now. That her body shouldn't feel so weighed down by now, that she should be okay even if it's just in front of him. _

_He's sitting at the foot of her bed with his legs crossed and she forces herself to sit up and move across the mattress so that she's siting close enough to him to take his hand. _

"_Me too, Jude." _

_She promises herself that she wont tell him how she really feels. She won't tell him about how she keeps waking up in the middle of the night with a pain in her chest that feels like someone is crushing her heart with their hands. She won't tell him about the tears, or about the blackness that seems to have engulfed her vision. She won't tell him, because then he'll know that she isn't strong enough to carry them both. _

"_Do you think dad will ever come back?" He asks quietly. _

_She sighs. "We don't need him, Jude." _

"_Bu-" _

"_We don't need him. We have each other. We don't need anyone. Got it?" _

_He nods gently. "Got it."_

.

Memories pass like a gentle breeze, but sometimes they knock her to her knees. People say that nostalgia is a weird feeling, but Callie wholeheartedly believes that it's the worst feeling in the entire world.

Sometimes she wishes that she could remove every good memory from before her mother died from her mind so that she doesn't have to dream about them, so that she doesn't wake up with the ghost of a smile on her lips.

Nostalgia hurts because it's always memories that she'll never get back.

People that she'll never get back.

Her mind is a mess.

It seems to happen a lot these days, like her thoughts are just jumbled up and nothing seems to make any sense.

She shouldn't feel this way. She should be _happy_. She's spent the past couple of years praying for this moment, praying to be here – or _anywhere –_ with Jude. She should be smiling, she should be asking him all about his life, she should be anything but _this_.

She can't stop thinking about all the times she wronged him, all the bad turns she took with him following closely behind. In all honesty, she isn't entirely guilty about having them seperated. That, she can deal with. That, she can forgive herself for.

But before then, in all those homes that never lasted, the ones that pushed them along to the next because of something _she _did – that she cannot forgive herself for.

Part of her hopes that he doesn't remember all of the things she did before, part of her hopes that his naïve mind has portrayed her as more of a saviour than a villian. But most of her knows that he can remember, that he's still mad.

That she is, too.

If there is one thing, and there really is only _one _thing, Callie Jacob is good for...it's messing things up. It's always been that way, even before her mother died. Sometimes she thinks that maybe she's subconsciously doing these things on purpose. Like she maybe enjoys the thrill of some of it, like maybe she's just plain _good _at being awful. At everything.

Every relationship has turned to dust in her warpath.

And Jude has been no exception.

It's different now, reallly, and she knew that it would be. He's older, and that means he understands more. Like he can see pain in her eyes, like he can see all of her mistakes. And they have less to talk about. It's not like before, not when she was his protector, not when she was his hero.

Now he's got a whole family of those, and Callie just has Callie.

She doesn't know how long she's been sitting outside for, but it's dark now and cold and she's curled up with her back pressed against the wall of the house.

She closes her eyes and tries to picture something nice, something good.

"_An, Can I ask you somethin'?" _

_Levi's voice emerges from the darkness in the room, and she turns in the bed so that she can see his sillhoute. "Shoot." _

"_Howcome you never talk about before you came here?" _

_Callie waits a moment, trying to be honest without being honest and then takes a deep breath. "I dunno, Lee. I just don't really like to think about that stuff." _

_The room falls into an easy silence, and she can hear his soft breathing. _

_In, and out. _

_And in. _

_out. _

"_An?" _

"_Yeah?"_

_She feels a hand on her arm. "Me, you, and Tash. We're a family. You know that, right?" _

_She smiles into the darkness. "I know that, Lee." _

"You look like you could use this."

The abrupt voice makes her jump from her memory and into the present, and she finds that there are tears dripping down her cheeks. She quickly wipes them away with her sleeve and looks up to see Stef standing over her, handing over a warm cup of tea.

"Thanks."

Stef hesitates for a moment, and then sits down on the ground next to Callie and brings her knees up to her chest.

"You've been out here for over an hour, you know."

Callie sighs and focuses on her hands, avoiding any form of eye contact because that would mean realising that she is actually _here _and that everything is about to be different now.

"I'm happy to see him..." She trails off, and she hates that her voice is still shaky.

"But?"

Callie smiles sadly at her cup of tea, and then lets out a tired sigh. "But it's just...different."

Stef stays silent for a moment and then, "I think he'll love you. No matter what."

Callie laughs, and Stef winces at the bitterness laced in her voice. "I think you're wrong. I think he's being set up for the biggest disappointment in his life."

Stef isn't sure how to respond, she isn't sure how to act at all around this girl. She's so different from her brother, so different from all of Stef's kids. So mature and yet...so..._young _at the same time. And it's difficult, because she _wants _to treat her the same way she'd treat Brandon In this situation but this isn't her daughter. This isn't her place.

Stef reaches out her hand and tries to touch Callie's knee, but the girl pulls away and averts her eyes to anywhere but Stef. "I think that you need to take time to prove yourself wrong, Callie."

And then Stef leaves her alone.

* * *

"Do you think she'll _ever _come inside?"

Stef looks up from her pot of soup to find Mariana and Jesus peaking out of the window. She doesn't say anything, just watches the twins – attempting to figure out how the other kids in the house might react to their new houseguest.

Jesus shrugs. "Beats me. How long has she been out there for?"

Mariana looks up at the clock on the wall. "Like, three hours? Surely moms are gonna make her come in...right?"

Jesus pushes back the curtains to get a better look and Stef tries to suppress a laugh at how nosey they are being.

"She's hot, though."

Mariana hits her brother and scoffs. "She's our brothers sister you creep."

"Yeah," Jesus laughs. "But she's not _our _sister."

"Right guys," Stef interrupts, coming up behind them and placing a hand on their shoulders. "Lets leave Callie alone and help mama set up for dinner, nosey parkers."

* * *

It's another two hours before anyone else comes out, and Callie seems to have found herself silently crying again. She isn't sure what it is that's upsetting her so much, but it's not like she hadn't been expecting it.

_There's too many ghosts in California. _

Jude sits down right next to her, and neither of them say anything for a while. She wonders what it is that Jude is thinking about, she wonders if he's already figured out all the ways that she's messed him up.

"Do you remember the night that mom died?"

Jude looks up at her face, and she can't help but notice just how much older he looks now. While the past two years has done nothing but hollow out Callies eyes and drain down her skin, she can see that her brother has been revitalised in a way. Like all of the joy, not that there wasn't any to begin with, has been pumped right back into his system

It's like...he's the same person that she left, he is, but so many things about him now are different. He's more mature, for a start. They could never talk about this stuff before – she never dared to bring it up. Maybe it was because she'd made a promise to do everything she could to protect him and she knew that talking about their mom always made him sad. Maybe she just knew it was another way to make things wrong.

He nods gently. "A little, yeah."

Callie smiles sadly and leans her head against the wall of the house. This is the calmest she's felt in months and, honestly, it sort of terrifies her. She's been in this house less than 24 hours and it's already effecting her. But what about when she has to move on? None of the stops before this place were easy, and none of them after it will be either.

"I wish things had happened differently." She admits quietly, and she reaches out and takes his hands. "I wish that I hadn't been so selfish."

Jude looks at her, confused, and she shakes her head.

"You don't remember?" She asks gently, and he shrugs.

"I lost it. I totally lost it and you were crying, Jude. You needed me and all I could do was scream about how Mom was gonna come home and it was all a big lie. You needed me and I was too busy being a baby and crying about it."

Jude tightens his grip on her hand. "We were only kids, Cal. You were young, too. I had you, I always had you...who was supposed to help _you_?"

"That doesn't matter." She breathes.

"Of course it matters, Cal." He says. "_You _matter."

Callie smiles sadly, knowing that her brother still isn't as mature as he looks. Knowing that he still doesn't understand all the ways that she's hurt him.

"I love you, you know?" She whispers.

"To the moon and back." He smiles and takes her hand. "Dinners ready, let's go inside."


End file.
